You might be a little bit confused about why a nail tech is talking hair but my dear sissy Mandy is a hairstylist and I feel confident in giving you a little direction (with her help!) on this topic.

I used to have beautiful blonde platinum hair, which I loved…until after about two weeks of my hair appointment when my dirty dishwater blonde hair started peeking through. Even with a sister that’s a hairstylist, I would put off my regrowth hair appointment as long as possible, usually at least 8 weeks. By then my roots were two inches long and I was looking rather unkempt 🙂

I talked to my amazing friend Kelsi Babcock who has been doing hair for 12 years now and is rocking the most beautiful ombre bronde on how I can get my hair to look like hers. She gave us some great tips which I’ll point out below…first I wanted to show you some pics! 🙂

This is me with blonde, blonde, blonde hair…

Here I am the day we did my color…we used a 7WN from Redken…it went rather dark because my blonde hair soaked it up like a dry sponge in a hurricane…

This is four weeks after we applied the color. It’s faded a lot and is exactly how I want it! I love it!

I can hardly stand to look at myself with platinum hair now…I look so washed out! I love the “bronde” look…it’s not quite brown and not quite blonde…

And then we watched these YouTube videos to get a good idea on technique…

Applying the Color

So it was actually really easy to do my hair…Mandy just sectioned my hair off and started on the bottom back section, brushing the color from my root to about my midshaft. She would go a little higher on some pieces and lower on others to make it look random and natural. She kept repeating this process until all my hair was covered. It was tricky not getting color on my blonde end pieces…but when we washed the color off after processing for 30 minutes we rinsed it down to the blonde pieces with water, letting it tone the tips, and this blended all the color together fabulously!

Tips and Tricks

As I mentioned in the picture, my blonde was so processed and damaged it soaked the color up really well! And my hair tends to pull VERY warm and gold so we used a Neutral color in order to keep it from going overly reddish/gold. I’m going to be honest, it’s a little splotchy and uneven after the first melting process, but as long as I keep my hair wavy it looks gorgeous! I hate straightening my hair anyway so that’s ok with me. We are doing it again tomorrow and I know it will blend together even better this time.

Adding More Blonde

As my blonde tips start to grow out and I want more blonde added, we will do the backcombing ombre technique and the balyage technique to add some more blonde highlights to my ends, which is a true “ombre”. What we did on my hair is actually a melt.

Products Used for Bronde Hair

Here are the Redken Products we used. You mix the color to the developer 1:1. Mix the 6N and the 8N equal parts to reach a 7N. If your natural root color is dark, you might need to add just a little bit more 6N to reach the right coverage. I am a natural “dishwater” blonde and a 7N covers my regrowth perfectly. These colors are not permanent so they will fade over time. Let the color process on your hair for 25 minutes. Make sure to rinse it out with just water first and “mush” your ends into the color to tone your roots to blend the platinum blonde with the bronde base. Let it sit on your ends for about 3 minutes and then finish washing with shampoo and conditioner.

Disclaimer: Everyone’s hair is unique and totally different. What worked on my hair may or may not work on your hair. I do not take any liability for any color processing done to anyone else’s hair but my own! 🙂

Styling Products I Used

I’d love to hear what you think? I know a lot of people aren’t crazy about the ombre look…one of my older clients told me she likes me better blonde 🙂 I love this look though! It’s so low-maintenance and I think it adds warmth and dimension to my skin. It’s so pretty for Autumn too!

When we did my hair last, I wanted a more neutral color, so we used Redken 7N. My hair pulls VERY warm and I love how the 7N doesn’t have too much red in it. But then I wanted some more blonde highlights added…so Mandy weaved thick and thin bleach through my hair before we touched up my roots. After the bleach had processed, she touched up my roots about 1.5″ down my hair shaft, let it process for about 25 minutes, and then when we washed it out we rubbed the color down through the highlights to tone them for about ten minutes. I love how it turned out! I might even lighten it up just a little bit more the closer we get to warm weather!

A more neutral bronde ombre

We added more blonde highlights throughout…can you tell?

Thanks for reading and if you have any questions at all let me know!

Tootles–Anna